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Pool Water Cloudy After Using Citric Acid


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Vinyl liner pool, 37,500 gallons. Used citric acid, about 18 lbs, to get rid of stains. did the trick day one, but on day 3, pool cloudy. day 5, went to leslies pool and they said ph low. added 10 lbs, went back 4 hours later, still low, another 4 lbs would do the trick. told me to use my setting of 2 on the heyward chlorinator when i usually use 3. still cloudy today. instead of 3 lbs of shock, i used 1.5 lbs. water looks green all over, i think that is just the chlorine.

so, will it burn off and everything right after that? take it back to leslies to test tomorrow evening?

suggestions>?

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Citric acid destroys chlorine until it is used up. You overdosed big time! Usual is abut a pound per 10K gallons so you only needed about 4 lbs! Water is most likely cloudy a green because algae has started growing.

HOWEVER, without knowing what your test results are it's really just guessing as to what is going on.

Post a full set of test results..

Who told you to use 10 lbs citric acid?

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Had water tested, the phosphate level was so so high, that they told me to add a bottle of pool perfect to bring the phosphates way down.

my DE filter is now on recirculate, as I was having to backwash the filter every hour and ran out of DE. Now the filter has a small pinprick shooting water out around the pressure guage area, and tried to use silicone sealant and that did not help. what next?

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You can't take advice from us and follow advice from a pool store. You have to pick one or the other. The phosphates were not the problem. They are food for algae, but you could have killed that off with chlorine alone. Now the phosphate remover has produced lanthanum phosphate precipitate that even further clouds the pool and clogs the filter. You still need to add chlorinating liquid or bleach to the pool until you get a Free Chlorine (FC) reading.

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Chemgeek, then I will use the collective wisdom here since this is a problem that pool owners have encountered. I have a 37,500 gallon pool so how much of this bleach to use. And where will I get it? I am going to try to scour this site and find an answer I hope.

Also now having a problem with my nautlius DE filter, since it has a pinhole leak out of the top where the guage is held to the top of the filter. tried using silicone adhesive to seal around there but does not look that will work. wonder if that whole guage and holder mechanism is replaceable, or if it is molded there and need a whole new top half.

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You can use The Pool Calculator to calculate dosing and you can use chlorinating liquid from a pool or hardware store if it's more economical than 6% unscented plain bleach (not "outdoor" or "splash-less"). Your pool is quite large so it would take a lot of chlorine to shock it. 10 ppm FC is 6 gallons of 6% bleach (or 8 96-ounce containers) or 3 gallons of 12.5% chlorinating liquid. Also, you need a good test kit such as the Taylor K-2006 since the FC target you need for shocking depends on your Cyanuric Acid (CYA) level. If the CYA is high (above 80 ppm), then you'll need to lower it by partial drain/refill to dilute the water.

As for your DE filter issues, others will have to chime in to help you on that.

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  • 8 years later...
On 7/1/2012 at 5:20 PM, memphisdude said:

Vinyl liner pool, 37,500 gallons. Used citric acid, about 18 lbs, to get rid of stains. did the trick day one, but on day 3, pool cloudy. day 5, went to leslies pool and they said ph low. added 10 lbs, went back 4 hours later, still low, another 4 lbs would do the trick. told me to use my setting of 2 on the heyward chlorinator when i usually use 3. still cloudy today. instead of 3 lbs of shock, i used 1.5 lbs. water looks green all over, i think that is just the chlorine.

so, will it burn off and everything right after that? take it back to leslies to test tomorrow evening?

suggestions>?

How did you ever solve your problem? I am having the same issue! Can anyone help?

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23 hours ago, Isabel Pelcastre said:

How did you ever solve your problem? I am having the same issue! Can anyone help?

You may have better luck if you start your own thread. This one is 8 years old. Include info about your situation, chem readings, maintenance routine, equipment, etc.

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